|
|
Post by soccerdad23 on Aug 14, 2019 15:35:08 GMT -5
Boys side view.. Much dialogue in the past few years about what is happening with DA, ECNL, NL, NPL, SCCL, Classic.. but I haven't seen any educated viewpoints as to where things will end.
Will there ever be a day when things appear to be well run across Georgia competitive youth soccer? If so what does it look like and are there any real plans under way to get there at this point - and can we help accelerate it? Are there any real plans? Please tell me there are!
Driver of question - son is on a National League Premier I team - strong team, but we have 8 teams in our division for a grand total of 7 league games. This isn't a league.. offers were made to play the other 3 GA teams in our division a 2nd time for more games, but there isn't much luster there when there are 20+ other high level teams in metro Atlanta that would be better scheduling including 6 GA teams in the Premier II division.
There is significantly higher cost in National League both thru the application process and ref fees which seems ridiculous to justify if this is what we are getting. National League is offering a showcase weekend in November in Florida, but with a cost of $600 for two games in addition to the league fee we are not planning to keep sending money the NL way. If anything National League should set these cross league showcases as included in an attempt to get to something that resembles enough matches. Instead, we are basically like the Notre Dame(independent football) of youth soccer working our tails off to schedule games.
Any optimistic viewpoints on the future?
|
|
|
|
Post by atlfutboldad on Aug 14, 2019 20:45:09 GMT -5
I've heard NL is better than ECNL.  Seriously though, sounds rough. Is NL Piedmont dying? On the girls side there are 5 or 6 GA teams in most of the brackets, telling me that SC or NC are having a difficult time getting teams to join (previously each state had 4 teams). No worries though, USYS has DPL in the pipe. |
|
|
|
Post by oraclesfriend on Aug 14, 2019 21:21:49 GMT -5
I've heard NL is better than ECNL. Seriously though, sounds rough. Is NL Piedmont dying? On the girls side there are 5 or 6 GA teams in most of the brackets, telling me that SC or NC are having a difficult time getting teams to join (previously each state had 4 teams). No worries though, USYS has DPL in the pipe. No offense to South Carolina but most of their teams struggled in Piedmont league last year so having 5-6 Georgia teams on the girls side may not be a bad thing. I will say that 7 games is not enough so I agree with the OP. I think anything 10 and under is not enough especially for the older kids who will only have club soccer in the fall. 14 seems to be a good amount of league games. Otherwise you need tournaments to get the numbers up and that is more money. I do not think that things will settle down in the years before my older one goes to college in the next few years. I hope it will for my younger one who is still in elementary school. |
|
|
|
Post by Soccerhouse on Aug 14, 2019 21:29:28 GMT -5
If I’m not mistaken a few years ago a RPL boys division had 7 teams with only 6 scheduled league games.
|
|
|
|
Post by guest on Aug 15, 2019 8:48:11 GMT -5
We played RPL for 3 yrs and always had 8 teams, 7 games. One year we didn’t even get that because of an out of state rain out (Or was it no refs? Or was it no field booked? I forget) that never got made up. Hence the impetus for SCCL. Maybe SCCL is better, maybe not. But we played 14 competitive games last Fall with minimal travel. Glad we are not in Piedmont Conference (please let’s not call it National League or NL unless you won PC and were promoted. This is very few teams from GA).
|
|
|
|
Post by soccerparent02 on Aug 15, 2019 17:40:09 GMT -5
NL is nowhere near as good as ECNL if your talking competition. Played both...
|
|
|
|
Post by fanatic21 on Aug 15, 2019 21:28:10 GMT -5
Boys or Girls? I’ve seen plenty of boys NL teams beat, tie, or lose close games against ECNL teams. In fact, I’ve never seen a non-competitive game between a boys NL team and boys ECNL team. Seen a few girls NL teams do well against ECNL teams too, but not as many and have seen more blowouts in favor of girls ECNL teams than I’ve seen close games
|
|
|
|
Post by soccerparent02 on Aug 15, 2019 22:26:37 GMT -5
Not sure when they played as ECNL has a full season with trips to Alabama, Florida, Tennessee, plus Ecnl only showcases in Philadelphia and Florida then playoffs in Illinois and Colorado. Kids played NPL teams in National playoffs but never a NL team. Played ECNL since first year of league.
|
|
|
|
Post by fanatic21 on Aug 16, 2019 10:51:40 GMT -5
Some NL and ENCL teams have play in friendlies and/or tournaments against each other. On the boys side, the games I've seen (and officiated) have been competitive. One the girls side, the ECNL teams have generally been quite a bit stronger (with a few exceptions here and there). Just my observations based on the games I've seen. Not trying to make a generalization about the overall level of play (as you did in your prevous post when you "NL is nowhere near as good as ECNL if you are talking competition"). Just stating that the evidence I've seen doesn't support your statement.
|
|
|
|
Post by ultimatedad on Aug 16, 2019 20:17:16 GMT -5
Our girls NL team has played ecnl teams 3 times over the last year and no one scored. Their goal is still shaking though from the shots hitting tge crossbar.
|
|
|
|
Post by soccerguru on Aug 16, 2019 20:25:20 GMT -5
CF's DA National Championship Runner-up team just played 3 ECNL teams at the Nike Select Cup and went 1-0-2, They have a good team but for a team that has played all summer, they should of mopped the floor with all 3 teams.
|
|
|
|
Post by oraclesfriend on Aug 17, 2019 6:38:51 GMT -5
CF's DA National Championship Runner-up team just played 3 ECNL teams at the Nike Select Cup and went 1-0-2, They have a good team but for a team that has played all summer, they should of mopped the floor with all 3 teams. I always find these statements interesting. These tournaments mean less than nothing to many teams. Now, I did not see these games and have no friends on this team so have no insider info about this team, but our team experimented the entire tournament. We had people playing in positions they had not played in 2-3 years. We had our starting line up in once for 20 minutes in the whole tournament. One of our opponents, who was beating us heavily, had their defenders switch to offense and the offense switch to defense in the second half for a while. One thing that I have learned in my years of watching youth soccer is that some teams play well as a team and some are individual skilled athletes. Often the teams that play well as a team have more long term familiarity with each other and the coach's style of play. There are also teams that can go on a good run...better than expected (this CF team exceeded expectations in the DA tournament). Soccer is also a game where luck can play a big role. Good for the teams that played well against them, but without context and actually seeing the game I don't draw any conclusions from it except to saying those teams can use it as bragging rights amongst themselves. |
|
|
|
Post by soccerguru on Aug 17, 2019 12:09:48 GMT -5
Fortunately, I got to watch most of these games because of many friends' kids on the Atlanta teams. CF had 1 player out, who was visiting WF. They played their starters in their correct roles, no mixing the O and D lines. A lot of bizatching and griping between the CF players that from what a player told me, as soon as we heard them screaming and cursing at each other, we knew they were in trouble.
I liked the way FC Alliance played, good smart team, not overly athletic but knew their roles and moved the ball and forwards finished. CF's direct style of play gives them many opportunities to score. AFU (only 14-15 kids ?) and Florida Elite needs to get in sync on the field, get in shape and know their roles.
I agree that many early season tourney's are used to evaluate talent in many roles, however that was not the case for CF.
|
|
|
|
Post by newposter on Aug 18, 2019 4:53:09 GMT -5
CF lost at a friendly at AU to a another ECNL team at the AU friendlies earlier this summer. Btw this ecnl team also beat AU.
|
|
